School: Ballybrittas (roll number 14013)
- Location:
- Ballybrittas, Co. Laois
- Teacher: Méadhbha Nic Labhráinn
Archival Reference
The Schools’ Collection, Volume 0835, Page 192
Image and data © National Folklore Collection, UCD.
See copyright details.
DownloadOpen data
Available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
- XML School: Ballybrittas
- XML Page 192
- XML “Hidden Treasure”
Note: We will soon deprecate our XML Application Programming Interface and a new, comprehensive JSON API will be made available. Keep an eye on our website for further details.
On this page
- One time there was a man named The O' Dempsey in Co Leix. He hid a crock of jewels, gold and silver, in the north wall of Ashfield House, near Ballybrittas in the parish of Lea. If anyone wants to get the treasure he has to knock the house down to do so. Every night at twelve o' clock he comes up the stairs, and goes into one of the end rooms. He counts the treasures and see if they are all right. Then he goes back again and disappears completely. The people who are living in the house now have seen him. He has a cloven foot and it taps on the stairs as he walks. The treasure was hidden many years. It was said that the owner used to turn the shoes of his horse backways so that no one would know which way he went to the treasure. His workmen once saw him and followed the track of the horse's hoofs on the clay and this is how it is known where the treasure is buried.
- Collector
- Shiela Eacrett
- Gender
- Female
- Address
- Ballybrittas, Co. Laois
- Informant
- T. Giltrap
- Age
- 53
- Address
- Ballybrittas, Co. Laois
